


Stormy Weather

by Mizmak



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Comfort, Cuddling & Snuggling, Declarations Of Love, First Kiss, Fluff, Happy Ending, M/M, Short & Sweet, Soppy, mild nightmare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-30
Updated: 2020-01-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:55:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22482160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mizmak/pseuds/Mizmak
Summary: Crowley has not expressed his love for Aziraphale until he can be certain it will be returned -- until a literal storm breaks the tension.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 130





	Stormy Weather

Crowley fell asleep on the bookshop sofa after an evening of dining and drinking with Aziraphale. He could have sobered up and driven home, but he was comfortable, it was midnight, and rain pounded down. 

So Aziraphale brought him a pillow and a blanket, and Crowley miracled himself into his pyjamas.

“I’ll be upstairs if you need anything, though I’m going to try to get a bit of sleep, too.” Aziraphale lay a hand on Crowley’s shoulder for an all too fleeting moment. “Good night.”

“Night, Angel.” He turned his face into the pillow to hide the deep sigh. Someday soon he would tell the angel how he felt. Very soon.

He listened to the soft footsteps treading up the stairs. He’d only ever been in Aziraphale’s living area once, over two hundred years ago when the bookshop first opened and he’d been given a tour.

There was a cozy sitting room with a fireplace, a bedroom, and bath. The furnishings were plush and rich, lots of damask and silk and dark woods, which he doubted had changed much over time.

He wished he could see the rooms again. He wished he were up there right now.

_If only…_ if only Aziraphale would simply break the silence that seemed to well up between them at awkward moments over the past few days. They were free from constraint, the first time in forever that they could _be_ together without fear of reprisal. They could be _closer_.

Crowley had been sending forth waves of love towards the angel for centuries, and he knew perfectly well that Aziraphale could sense it. He had sought out his company as often as possible over the millennia, he had rescued him from discorporation more times than he cared to think about.

He had tried to keep him close and safe during the past hectic week even when the angel was being a bastard – though, he felt, with good cause. 

After they had finished that celebratory meal at the Ritz, they had gone back to the bookshop for a nightcap. Crowley had wanted to take Aziraphale in his arms then, yet somehow he hadn’t. Aziraphale _knew_ that he was loved. Why wouldn’t _he_ be the one to speak first? 

Did he not _want_ to?

And that one thought prevented Crowley from saying a single word. Yes, he could not help noticing the way Aziraphale gazed at him from time to time, especially after Crowley had done him a favor – clearly it was a look of deep affection. Probably even love – of a kind – an angelic kind that anyone coming into Aziraphale’s good graces would receive.

But was it anything more than that?

He dearly hoped so.

The thought of finding out differently pained him beyond measure, and so he kept silent.

If only he hadn’t lost that angelic ability to sense love when he had fallen…Crowley regretted that loss more than anything else. Then he would know. He _had_ felt a flicker of it, a faint memory of that sensation of love, on a few treasured occasions in the angel’s presence, seemingly coming from him…but it had come too lightly and vanished too swiftly. 

He couldn’t tell if it had been real.

Up above him, Aziraphale would be going to bed. Alone.

Crowley closed his eyes and let sleep take him away from the world.

He awoke to the sound of thunder. 

He liked storms. 

A flash of lightning lit up the shop, casting eerie shadows on the bookcases. Crowley counted the seconds until the boom sounded. Six seconds. 

He sat up to look at the grandfather clock – just gone two. And still raining, though not as hard. A wind had picked up. He could hear the strident gusts even in here, a fierce wind that shook the windowpanes. A fantastic storm.

After the next lightning flash, the thunderclap sounded only four seconds away. Drawing closer. A shiver of excitement flew along his spine. He had sought out storms from time to time, especially the truly big ones – especially along the northern coasts. They were better to watch in the daytime, of course, with skies turning a roiling black, with huge bolts crackling through the clouds, with winds tearing through the trees.

He liked to watch the heavens being torn asunder. 

Crowley got up from the sofa to pad over to the nearest window. He couldn’t see much, though. Just the flickering city lights, the overhead wires whipping in the wind, and a bit of litter blown along the rain-soaked pavement.

Then the whole street suddenly lit up in a brilliant flash, and he didn’t even have time to count the seconds before the boom crashed through the night.

The whole bookshop rattled – he turned away from the shaking window to see a mug fall off the desk, and a book topple from a table. Amazing. The storm was directly overhead.

He waited eagerly for the next thunderclap, but before he could truly enjoy the anticipation, he heard the shout from above.

_Aziraphale_.

The shouts turned into a scream.

Crowley ran for the stairs, and bounded up them two at a time. He fumbled blindly down the corridor in a rush, banging into the wall several times before finding the door to the angel’s rooms.

Aziraphale hated storms. Had done so ever since the great flood. He knew that, and had utterly forgotten about it in his own indulgence. _Damn._

He dashed through the sitting room, his way aided by another lightning flash, then into the bedroom. 

The close boom hit just as he reached the bed, and Aziraphale, who sat bolt upright, shaking, mouth open in a wordless cry.

Crowley climbed onto the bed and took him into a tight hold. “Angel, hush, it’s all right.”

He felt Aziraphale tighten against him, then abruptly relax into his embrace. “Crowley….” He let out a deep moan. “You’re here.”

“Of course I am. It’s only a storm, it will pass.” He rubbed the angel’s back, massaging away the fear.

Aziraphale wrapped his arms around him, and lay his head on Crowley’s shoulder. “Sorry…it wasn’t just the storm…”

“What?” He brushed a hand through the angel’s hair. “It wasn’t?”

“Not wholly – the thunder – the flashes – I was dreaming. They came inside the dream. It became a battle – the sounds of war.”

He felt Aziraphale shiver. “Hush. You’re awake. It’s all right.”

Lightning lit up the room again, though not as strongly. And the next clap of thunder sounded farther off. _Good_. The storm was moving away.

He stroked the angel’s tense arms. He felt the muscles loosen.

“It was a war,” Aziraphale whispered. Another tremor rippled through him. “ _The_ war…the one that didn’t happen….”

Crowley started. _That_ was his nightmare? “Armageddon?”

“Yes.” Aziraphale lifted his head to look into his eyes. “It was a nightmare – we didn’t stop it, the war started – and you were torn away from me, back to Hell.”

A flickering light from the streetlamp through the window allowed Crowley to see the tears in the angel’s eyes. “Don’t – it didn’t happen.” As a single tear trickled down Aziraphale’s cheek, he instantly brushed it away. “It _wouldn’t_ have happened like that.”

Aziraphale touched Crowley’s face. “It was damned _real_. I _lost_ you. _Forever_.” He choked down a sob as more tears fell.

“Shhh. That would never happen.” He tightened his hold as the lightning brightened the room again, though fainter this time, farther away. He counted the seconds, reaching eight before the thunderclap. 

He suddenly hated storms.

He loosened his hold so that he could brush away more tears. Aziraphale quivered lightly. Then he clasped Crowley’s hand and brought it to his lips, and he kissed the top of it. “I don’t _ever_ want to lose you.”

And that was when he felt it. Not a flicker of love – not this time.

Crowley gasped as he _sensed_ love, for the first time in six thousand years, the way he once could. A _wave_ of love, a _storm_ of love that roared into him from his Angel…a furious, raging love that shook him to the core and left him reeling. 

“ _Aziraphale_ …” There were no words. He didn’t need words. Crowley put his hand beneath the angel’s chin to gently tilt his head upwards, and then he kissed him.

As their lips met, a long cascading roll of thunder sounded far away, a faded echo of the storm in his heart and soul. Aziraphale _kissed_ him, with a touch more fierce than ever dreamt of, and Crowley poured a thousand thousand years and more of hunger into that merging.

They kissed away the fear, and they kissed away the doubt. All that remained was love.

He moved on – lips touching the angel’s cheeks, his forehead, back down to his mouth again, and on to his throat and the hollow there. He buried his face against Aziraphale’s chest. “I love you,” he murmured, deep within their embrace, and again, “I love you,” as a quavering tremor pulsed through him.

“I’ve known that for a long time.” Aziraphale caressed his back, stroking in gentle circles. “I tried to let you know that I loved you, too, any way that I could – any way that was _safe_.”

The longer those gentle, soothing hands caressed him, the more Crowley relaxed, the more the quivering storm within receded. The solace that took its place was a quiet release, one that he’d been wanting for an eternity. “All you have to do is _be_ here, Angel. Just – please just always be _here_.”

“Lay down beside me,” Aziraphale replied, “and I’ll be here, holding on.”

_Yes_. They settled down beneath the covers. Crowley stretched out alongside, _close_ as he could get, as Aziraphale enveloped him. He listened to the light rain patter on the window. He listened to an angel breathing deeply. He listened to his own constant heartbeat.

_Hold on_.

They held each other all night and into the morning, and the dawn that broke upon them was the most glorious dawn the Earth had ever seen.


End file.
